I have been pleasantly excited about public hearings conducted by the Public Accounts Committee of Ghana’s parliament. Over the past couple of days the Public Accounts Committee has held public hearing on queries raised by the Auditor-Generals’ report for 2004/2005.

Staff of various Ministries, Departments and Agencies have all appeared before the committee to answer queries raised in the report. The public has been overwhelmed by reports of overpayments of contractors, improper award of consultancy services and uncompetitive procurement methods which contributed to the loss of funds running into billions of cedis.

Ghanaians have for the past couples weeks been inundated with news of the New Patriotic Party’s presidential aspirants formally declaring their intentions to contest the party’s presidential slot. In a typical Ghanaian fashion, we have seen a lot of fun fair associated with picking nomination forms, filing nominations and launching their campaigns in different parts of the country.

A number of interesting issues have emerged concerning the New Patriotic Party’s opening of nominations; chief among them is the number of aspirants who have picked up their nominations forms to contest the flagbearership. Twenty people have so far collected forms; I believe the largest number of aspirants ever in the history of any political party since the forth republic came into being in 1992.There is also the issue of the large number of former ministers who were either kicked out of the government by the current president or resigned their positions to become aspirants. There are those who believe the larger number of aspirants gives credence to the fact that the NPP has men of talent and experience. We however wait for the end to the filing of nominations to see if all twenty men will return their forms and pay up the 250 million old cedis (a little over $ 24,000 dollars) as their filing fees.

Ghanaians have since July 1 switched to a new currency, the “New Ghana Cedi.” It is of the same value as the old currency but with fewer zeros to it. The new denominated cedi seem to be receiving some good reviews, it has been described as been easier to handle.

This comes as no surprise at all as Ghanaians over the years have complained about the bulky nature of our currency. The introduction of the New Ghana Cedi has reduced the quantity of notes carried by people. Before the introduction of the new Ghana cedi, its was impossible to carry two million old cedis (equivalent of 186 US dollars) in a wallet but now I can carry five times the same amount in my wallet depending on the notes.

As the political scene warms up in Ghana, many people are watching to see how sophisticated Ghanaians politicians will be this time round. As to whether the campaigning will take the same form of noisy rallies, promise mongering, indiscriminate postings of posters on walls, Radio, TV and newspaper advertisements as well as the usual euphoria that characterizes election campaigns or something totally different.

Already I see an improvement on the last election campaigns in 2004. While the New Patriotic Party (NPP) goes through the process of selecting a candidate for the 2008 elections, the National Democratic Congresses (NDC) presidential candidate Professor Evans Attah-Mills has kicked started his campaigns. Professor Mills seems to have a new appreciation for wooing voters. He is using door-to-door campaigns. That isn’t easy but likely to engage voters on a personal basis and perhaps win him some extra votes if the voters find his ideas plausible. I’ve read stories of Professor Mills becoming a foot soldier himself and interacting with people in places like Abossey Okai and he has plans of replicating it in other places across the country. That definitely looks like an innovation.

Ghana is once again at the crossroads of another political decision, this time its on the implementation of the Representation of the Peoples’ Amendment Act (ROPAA), which gives voting rights to Ghanaians abroad in the next general elections in 2008.The Electoral Commission (EC) has proposed to implement the ROPAA in countries with a minimum of 500 Ghanaian resident Ghanaian. The EC is also proposing that the highest ranking government official in Ghana’s missions would be mandated to head the supervision of exercise to register Ghanaians and the counting of the ballots in the Presidential elections come December, 2008. 


All the political parties have not accepted the implementation of ROPAA in 2008; the National Democratic Congress (NDC), the Peoples National Convention (PNC) and the EGLE Party have registered their disapproval of the implementation of the law in the 2008 elections. They recently walked out on a meeting called by the EC to discuss their proposal. The Convention Peoples Party is yet to state its position on the issue.